MyHouse.wad

[DoomPlayer00]

39 minutes ago, Andromeda said:

I have received permission to reveal the author's identity so this gets put to rest at last, open the spoiler at your own risk:

 

  Hide contents

@Veddge

Holy crap!

[ShallowB]

1 hour ago, Andromeda said:

I have received permission to reveal the author's identity so this gets put to rest at last, open the spoiler at your own risk:

 

  Hide contents

@Veddge

 

Big if true.

[SealTeam6]

My House is absolutely insane in the best possible way.  I'm in my 50s and have played doom/doom 2 since they first came out. As with the lore of My House, my buddy and I starting making our own maps for ourselves using the crude tools available back then (dck I think). We only shared our maps with each other and never uploaded them online. We also made a lot of death match levels that we played against each other over our 14.4k modems. Unfortunately, those maps were buried in a landfill long ago.

 

A couple of years ago I got the itch to play doom/doom 2 again. I started to watch YT walk through videos mostly bc I forgot where the secrets were located on the original maps. In watching these videos, I discovered Doomsday and GZDoom. I started to download maps. It's amazing to see the creativity in the maps people are making today.

 

Like many of you, I stumbled upon My House and the attention it was getting on YT and Twitch. It led me here to the Doom World thread. It became clear there was so much more to this map that was yet to be uncovered. I started playing the map with the little information that started to come out. All I can say is WOW. After playing for many hours, I got stumped. I started to watch more videos and was fun to watch others play and make discoveries I would have never found on my own. I really enjoyed their commentary as they continued to explore and find new areas. It didn't take very long for the savvy doom players to figure out all that the map has to offer. 

 

Congrats to the author(s) of this incredible map and for creating such a buzz online in the dooming community. It's definitely a journey of emotion and discovery. I hope they make more maps like this that becomes more than just a game.

 

I want to get back into building my own maps. I installed doom builder 2, but for the life of me I haven't figured out much more than to make a room without any doors. I'm sure there are some tutorials on YT and I will eventually figure it out. Sadly, I have not seen my old friend from back in the day. I hope he's doing well and is still playing doom!

 

Cheers!

Edited May 6, 2023 by SealTeam6
clean up typos mostly, but add some addional thoughts

[Snaxalotl]

I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about walking simulators.

[MissArgent]

9 hours ago, Andromeda said:

I have received permission to reveal the author's identity so this gets put to rest at last, open the spoiler at your own risk:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

@Veddge

 

Now do you remember? Who you are? What you were meant to do? I cheated death, thanks to you. And thanks to you I've left my mark. You have too. You've written your own history. You're your own man. I'm Veddge, and you are too... No... He's the two of us. Together. Where we are today? We built it. This story - this "legend" - it's ours. We can change the world - and with it, the future. I am you, and you are me. Carry that with you, wherever you go. Thank you... my friend. From here on out, you're Veddge.

[Tycholarfero]

f know it's prob not 100% my place to say, but I fully believe that the person behind Veddge wanting to remain anonymous is the best possible decision. I honestly don't think Veddge, as an account, should ever be touched again (*UNLESS* the author really wants something juicy to happen with it.) I love this lingering feeling that's left behind from the obituary reveal from the QR code, it's been in my mind for the full month after I've discovered it, it unironically made me ask everyone I know personally who plays Doom in any regard to give the map a try themselves. Veddge is a memorial of its own for Steve, just as the map is a memorial for Tom, fictional or not, it gets the point across for me. Hell I even figured as much now that the fact that Veddges' profile image is just STYX, it clicked in my head why that's even there, which is something I love. I love how many interpretations and all the speculative elements of the map, whether right or wrong, I always felt like that was the point and that the authors identity wasn't important for the purpose of the map, and I appreciate that they feel the same way too. I honestly have enjoyed theory crafting with friends and just wandering the map with -nomonsters on, looking for things I missed, seeing what triggers or not. I love the eerie and downright sinister atmosphere it leaves me feeling, Veddges' posts give me a weirdly sinister feel even now, after two months. Author, I appreciate you, and thanks for making this; for me, it's legitimately the best piece of horror media I think I've personally seen in a very long time, and I heavily doubt anything will top it for me any time soon, especially with how often it makes me return to the post at 3 AM my time whenever I think about it

Edited May 7, 2023 by Tycholarfero

[MugMonster]

9 hours ago, Snaxalotl said:

I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about walking simulators.

 

what do you mean?  I assume you're joking but even still I dont see what this wad has to do with walking simulators

[Macil]

Just wanted to say I really enjoyed seeing Not Jabba's very investigative posts and then their conclusion. I'm not hurting for details about their private communication they had. I feel like my itch for the out-of-game mystery has been fully itched and I'm comfortable leaving that part there now. I'm more curious now about how this mod is going to inspire other mods and what design lessons people are going to take from this map.

[houston]

Unless the actual account "Veddge" posts under this thread again, I don't fully buy it. It could just be an elaborate troll NJ decided to do once he got bored with it, or personally turned around and decided things were getting out of hand.

[ultra_kek]

On 5/4/2023 at 7:14 PM, DavidN said:

Amazing! How did I never notice that…?

 

AND! “ANNA” in the Cancelled jumble - is that our A in S+A?!

Spoiler

Excluding the departed flights and including this Cancelled jumble (I also can't believe I didn't notice this until it was pointed out, even if I never looked too deeply at the Departures before), that makes for "HELP ME", "ANNA". I still question if the narrative supports a distinct wife character specifically, but I do think it makes for a very good candidate for "A". The kind of carving the S+A represents is typically related to childhood, and if I remember correctly the airport and the daycare are the two places with children's drawings. The airport, more directly relevantly, is the location of the bathroom event with the switching gender signs, so I wonder if "ANNA" would be meant to relate to that specifically.

In the aims of double checking everything to see anything else I have missed, I also want to make the following notes:

Spoiler

Besides the Gate Key, the only lock with a message is the Quarter lock, with the text "Can Happiness be found by running away from your problems." I do not know much about the quarter and the gas station payphone, but I find this specific phrase to be interesting given the themes of the wad. As content that is apparently unused within the actual map but which is still present in the pk3 file would you consider this part of the narrative? Also, which version of the payphone had the usable linedef? This text could have multiple meanings, given both that players need to "fight for their happiness" to reach the real beach instead of going to the fake beach, but also that they will likely be running back out of the gas station to the normal house once the nearly indestructible mirror arch-vile spawns, perhaps itself representing problems being run away from. I still think it is interesting that the fake beach is the one that can "end" the game by turning everything black, while you seem to be stuck on the real beach forever (at least, I think so, I just realized I'm not sure if anything happens if you wait long enough and I don't think I have a save close enough to be able to check without having to go through that gauntlet again, lol).

Looking at the SHADOW figure from the outside of the brutalist house, I am considering if it may be related to the mirror arch-vile. It does possess a similar gauntness to the arch-vile. I've seen it described as appearing "feminine" and while I did not interpret it as such when I saw it in game, looking at the sprite in the pk3 I do see the round head shape implying a head of long hair. The outside of the brutalist house also is where the TV event is located, which is similar in some ways to the fake beach, in causing the screen to turn completely black. Could these be related? Maybe the purpose of the TV could be as foreshadowing regarding the fake beach with the clapboard, and the static channel simply serving as a reminder that the mirror house is a unique counterpart to the normal house, not just any other variation, and by extension a smaller hint towards the mirror gas station and the two beaches. I still don't know what significance Channel 3 could have, though. Maybe this could just be an obscure reference? There's certainly a lot in this wad that seems to just be a joke rather than relevant to the plot, like the inclusion of the actual backrooms or the fact that the actor name for the "Forgotten Memories" artifact is "lookatthisphotograph", as I've noticed just now.

 

Also, while combing through the Journal again I noticed the Death of a Salesman mention again, and besides the thematic relevance it brought to mind how the play ended with Willy Loman committing suicide via car, which makes me wonder if the gas station and the car dream is meant to relate to this.The Gas Station is central to the fake, secret, and gravestone endings. Following my interpretation of the Steven obituary belonging to the mirror counterpart from the dream, maybe this could be how they died? The mirror version of the gas station is the bloodier one, perhaps suggesting an actual death opposite of the small stains in the normal version. Following there being two Stevens, this could be the culmination of Steven's obsession and absorption into the wad, figuratively running away from everything by constructing a false version of events in which he died from a real car crash only to end up on the false beach. Alternatively, following the interpretation that Steven really did die and published the wad posthumously, it could be his real cause of death and the "dream" simply being some kind of coping mechanism, although I don't really see much change before and after the related journal entry to support this.

 

Related to that last point, I just had the realization that I think the obituary is the only place in which the name "Steven" is used, as all other media refers to Veddge as "Steve". Inversely, Thomas' obituary specifies that either Tom or Thomas is acceptable, and while the forum post refers to him as Tom, the journal refers to him as Thomas (when he is named and not just "my friend"). This could perhaps support the idea of there being two versions of Veddge, in this case the living "Steve" and the deceased "Steven".

 

Lastly, just to throw this out there, I was thinking about the endless stairwell and what relevance it could have to the narrative. Its a very uniquely designed area of the map, with textures unlike any other area. The only remotely similar area I can think of is the parking garage of the airport, in that it loops around itself. Is there anything that could line up with this area? Perhaps as a reference to something like the inspirations for the brutalist, bathhouse, and daycare houses or the backrooms area, or some kind of thematic significance? It had just crossed my mind that besides the question of its mechanics and the unused area next to it in the map, the stairwell hadn't really come up in discussion.

In regards to the identity of "Veddge", To me personally the "true" identity of the account's owner was functionally irrelevant from the start, since within the narrative Veddge's identity is already provided as that of Steve Nelson. To me interest in the true identity would just come from curiosity regarding the creator behind the scenes, in the same way anyone may be curious about the author of a work while understanding that the author's background may be completely irrelevant to said work. It is respectable for the creator of the wad to seek to remain completely anonymous. While I still am curious about the real house, I think it would be fair to accept that attempting to locate it in the real world may be an invasion of privacy. One question I do wish could be answered is simply regarding the production of the narrative itself: Is the creator of the wad the original owner of the account, or are they someone who had been given access to it for the purposes of setting up the narrative? I don't really expect this to be answered, as this would be essentially pulling back the curtain, and even if it's not as invasive (relatively), I can certainly see it as something opposed to the nature of the work as unfiction.

Edited May 7, 2023 by ultra_kek

[Horus]

25 minutes ago, houston said:

Unless the actual account "Veddge" posts under this thread again, I don't fully buy it. It could just be an elaborate troll NJ decided to do once he got bored with it, or personally turned around and decided things were getting out of hand.

Anything other than it being a factual statement would be out of character for NJ imo.

 

37 minutes ago, Macil said:

I'm more curious now about how this mod is going to inspire other mods and what design lessons people are going to take from this map.

It’s an interesting question, the latter one is in a way hard to answer as in many ways Doom itself takes a backseat, it is more just a platform used to tell a story. But one thing it has inspired me to explore further in my own maps is to give more meaning and interest to optional and secret areas, rather than say the conventional ’trigger closet X to get secret item Y’. It’s something I started doing in my most recent map, and myhouse has made me keen to explore it further and see what I come up with.

[princetontiger]

On 5/6/2023 at 8:56 AM, SealTeam6 said:

My House is absolutely insane in the best possible way.  I'm in my 50s and have played doom/doom 2 since they first came out. As with the lore of My House, my buddy and I starting making our own maps for ourselves using the crude tools available back then (dck I think). We only shared our maps with each other and never uploaded them online. We also made a lot of death match levels that we played against each other over our 14.4k modems. Unfortunately, those maps were buried in a landfill long ago.

 

A couple of years ago I got the itch to play doom/doom 2 again. I started to watch YT walk through videos mostly bc I forgot where the secrets were located on the original maps. In watching these videos, I discovered Doomsday and GZDoom. I started to download maps. It's amazing to see the creativity in the maps people are making today.

 

Like many of you, I stumbled upon My House and the attention it was getting on YT and Twitch. It led me here to the Doom World thread. It became clear there was so much more to this map that was yet to be uncovered. I started playing the map with the little information that started to come out. All I can say is WOW. After playing for many hours, I got stumped. I started to watch more videos and was fun to watch others play and make discoveries I would have never found on my own. I really enjoyed their commentary as they continued to explore and find new areas. It didn't take very long for the savvy doom players to figure out all that the map has to offer. 

 

Congrats to the author(s) of this incredible map and for creating such a buzz online in the dooming community. It's definitely a journey of emotion and discovery. I hope they make more maps like this that becomes more than just a game.

 

I want to get back into building my own maps. I installed doom builder 2, but for the life of me I haven't figured out much more than to make a room without any doors. I'm sure there are some tutorials on YT and I will eventually figure it out. Sadly, I have not seen my old friend from back in the day. I hope he's doing well and is still playing doom!

 

Cheers!

 

I love reading responses like this. I played a lot of Doom and Rise of the Triad over LAN back in the late 90s. I rediscovered online Doom (ZDaemon and Skulltag) around 2004, and I've been hooked on Doom off and on since then. Unfortunately, multiplayer Doom declines every year... but offline single player continues to be really strong.

Edited May 7, 2023 by princetontiger

[YeOldeFellerNoob]

On 5/6/2023 at 5:15 PM, Snaxalotl said:

I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about walking simulators.

Well... Technically, the wad does turn into a Slaughter Wad near the end.

[Snaxalotl]

5 minutes ago, YeOldeFellerNoob said:

Well... Technically, the wad does turn into a Slaughter Wad near the end.

Doom isn't an fps because it has story screens at the end of each episode.

But honestly though, is something really exempt from categorization because a tiny fraction of the gameplay doesn't adhere to it? Walking simulators can have combat.

[Fernito]

On 5/7/2023 at 12:15 AM, Snaxalotl said:

I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about walking simulators.

I'm sorry if I'm misinterpreting this, maybe it's because English is not my native language, but I can't tell whether this comment is meant to be funny or dismissive. To me it sounds more like "I don't know what all the fuss is about", in a pretentious/condescending way. Kinda like posting "I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about vanilla pwads" in the KDiKDiZD thread.

[Snaxalotl]

7 hours ago, Fernito said:

I'm sorry if I'm misinterpreting this, maybe it's because English is not my native language, but I can't tell whether this comment is meant to be funny or dismissive. To me it sounds more like "I don't know what all the fuss is about", in a pretentious/condescending way. Kinda like posting "I'm surprised it took the doom community almost 30 years to learn about vanilla pwads" in the KDiKDiZD thread.

 

Doom doesn't have nearly as many wads like myhouse though, I'm surprised that a different genre being represented in a doom sourceport got so popular considering how far removed it is from what people typically like about doom.

 

If the surprise at the extreme sudden interest in this wad is considered being condescending/pretentious then that just makes me shocked at the hostility surrounding anything that could vaguely be interpreted as insulting myhouse or the people that enjoy it.

 

Additionally not all jokes are hostile, I'm not here to tell people what they can and can't like. Just express surprise that if this is the type of doom wad that is so popular, then why did it take so long to get here. Mainly because walking simulators aren't that new of a concept either.

[DavidN]

I definitely interpreted it as "it's only a walking simulator, jesus christ, why are you all so excited about this" but I'm glad that it wasn't :)

 

What is a walking simulator - a game that focuses minimally on combat? I've seen a few in Doom before, so the concept isn't entirely new to me, but nothing I've seen before in Doom has toyed with the player this much - that's the part that I think people are most focused on, rather than just the unusually low amount of combat (until the spike near the end)

[Catpho]

Yeah, the popularity probably comes from the sheer imagination of the meta-play and the general design and how it dovetails nicely with its plot. In terms of Doom walking simulators, there's already Grove (2004), 5till L1 Complex (2012), Comatose (2016), The Given (2017), Chris Lutz's Inferno m01 (1998), Aliens TC m01 (1994), Sacrament m02 (2011), BTSX hubs (∞). The form that MyHouse delivered it is probably more worth examining when trying to explain its great acclaim.

Edited May 8, 2023 by Catpho

[Groplaw]

I thought walking simulators were primarily defined by having no real combat, or puzzles, but an experience you go from A-B to play out a story?

 

 

It doesn't seem like that fits myhouse.wad, its too focused on puzzle solving, combat elements, and player choices to really be one.  Don't get me wrong, I actually like walking simulators, so I don't take "walking simulator" as derogatory, but myhouse has more in common with even something like old zork text adventures than a walking sim.

 

Like I think "player choice" and "twitch skill involvement" are the key points that separate a walking sim, otherwise every game becomes a walking sim. The fact Myhouse has parts I died repeatedly in, some tense low ammo fights, surprise attacks, and multiple paths and endings, excludes it in my mind at least.  Otherwise the very linear Half Life is a walking sim where you go A-B with some combat if things are broken down that much.

[Amiga Angel]

When I think of a walking simulator .. I think of games like Fallout 3 or 4 for example... not doom mods/TCs/maps/?... Maybe those rare few gigantic city maps could qualify if they had much less combat and more puzzles? I dunno.

 

[Not Jabba]

3 minutes ago, Catpho said:

Yeah, the popularity probably comes from the sheer imagination of the meta-play and the general design and how it dovetails nicely with its plot. In terms of Doom walking simulators, there's already Grove (2004), 5till L1 Complex (2012), Comatose (2016), The Given (2017), Chris Lutz's Inferno m01 (1998), Aliens TC m01 (1994), Sacrament m02 (2011), BTSX hubs (∞).

And A Lost Soul! And Jumpwad! And a lot of endmaps have kinda been refined into this whole genre of tiny walking simulators. To me, Jumpwad is the most "walking simulator" thing created in Doom so far, despite the jumping -- the whole driving force of gameplay is just to...go places.

 

So I guess what felt a little bothersome to me about the walking simulator comment is that it felt like it was dismissing a whole bunch of the Doom community's prior accomplishments. I don't want to pile on poor Snax, because it doesn't seem like she meant it that way, but...yeah, as unique as MyHouse is, and as much as I'd love to see more maps with this much of an emotional-expressive artistic focus and this many monsterless spaces, I think it's worth celebrating that it isn't the first time anyone's tried to evoke many of these different vibes that it has.

 

MyHouse offers a lot of lessons for those who want to continue the genre, though. A lot of lessons for all mappers, really. We wouldn't be talking about it so much if it hadn't answered our wildest dreams and shattered our wildest expectations, even with how much Doom mapping has already evolved since 1994.

[Groplaw]

I do love when doom plays with different genres.  Like I could totally go for a beautiful doom walking sim, some doom metroidvanias, doom RPGs, heck I'd love to see someone make a doom lucas arts style adventure game.

 

I think those genre departures are fun in doom because they are a departure from the norm of doom releases.  Going against the grain of the base game helps them stand out.  If a year from now there are 500 myhouse copies burying anything else I'd probably feel different

[Fernito]

@Snaxalotl I appreciate you took the time to clarify, I see what you mean now. I definitely interpreted yor post the wrong way, so I apologize for that. 

[ReaperAA]

I won't call MyHouse a walking simulator. I feel that on the gameplay side, MyHouse is more similar to the point and click adventure games of the late-80s/early-90s (thinking those from Sierra and Lucasarts) than anything else.

[Tristan]

4 hours ago, Snaxalotl said:

I'm surprised that a different genre being represented in a doom sourceport got so popular considering how far removed it is from what people typically like about doom.

 

I admit that I also misinterpreted your earlier post as being dismissive, but yeah I'm fully with you on this. I love it when Doom WADs throw out the combat and go all out with the atmosphere/exploration aspect and I'm surprised at how popular this WAD has become. I genuinely wonder how much traction this would have gotten if it released 5 or 10 years ago, because as others have said, this is far from the first time that the boundary has been pushed, but I think it's fair to say nothing (that I can think of) has done it quite like myhouse, and nothing generated this much hype and discussion, but I can't help but noticed that WADs like Grove and The Given are seeing a bit of a resurgence in popularity lately. Perhaps we have some certain Doomtubers to thank for that, but it does indicate that maybe there's just a greater interest in the community now for WADs that really deviate from the norms.

[ShallowB]

Part of the problem is the term "walking simulator" is used as an insult half the time.  It can be hard to tell if someone's just describing a game that is experienced primarily by exploring the environment or if they are criticizing it for a perceived lack of gameplay. 

 

I think the reason Myhouse has gotten so popular is not because it's doing anything new, but because it's doing what it does really well.  We've had maps with stories in the txt file for a long time, but never anything that integrates with the gameplay quite like this.  We've had maps with environmental storytelling, but never anything that feels like you're a detective uncovering a mystery.  We've had maps with portals, but never anything that feels this seamless and convincingly alien. 

 

On top of being impressive to the Doom community, I've seen a lot of people with absolutely no interest in Doom taking notice of MyHouse.  Its similarity to creepypastas and ARGs has given it much wider reach than most other Doom walking simulators.

Edited May 8, 2023 by ShallowB

[SkeletSpook]

Signed in just to get on this hype train (altho I'm sure I still have an account somewhere from many years ago).Really liking this WAD, but I also echo some sentiments I've seen here:
 

Spoiler

 

Part of me was slightly disappointed when I realised what the mod was actually doing. I was already aware that it was a House of Leaves kind of thing but then stuff like the Backrooms and Poolrooms showing up felt a bit too familiar and I wished the WAD had done its own thing a bit more. I think "Liminal Space horror" definitely has a lot of potential as a genre without falling back on the same tropes over and over. On the other hand, the familiarity does have something nice to it and it's fun to see some of these creepypasta locations in the Doom engine and how they are transposed onto the lay-out of the House. It's almost like visiting a place from the collective unconscious.
Still, definitely not the most original thing. Even the opening section where the House keeps changing slightly reminded me a lot of the game Anatomy.

 

Incidentally I'm playing through Control at the moment and it's interesting to see both Control an myhouse.wad do similar things, they're both clearly influenced by House of Leaves as well as internet horror (in Control's case SCP foundation, I don't think Backrooms was already such a thing when it came out). But whereas Control takes the core elements of its influences to build its own thing, myhouse.wad copies and pastes its influences, only tweaking them slightly. That said, there's some stuff myhouse.wad legit does better than Control, such as creating a sense of dream logic.

 

My real joy from the WAD came mostly from just discovering how deep the rabbit hole kept going, stuff like finding out you could go to a mirrored Underhalls or a hospital after you died, literally made me laugh out loud at how crazy detailled and expansive it all is.

 

One thing I haven't seen discussed here, but I haven't gone through all 29 pages so I'm sure it was, is how the picture of Steve and Tom feels off, could it be AI generated?

 

 

[Klear]

45 minutes ago, SkeletSpook said:

(altho I'm sure I still have an account somewhere from many years ago).

 

Hold onto it! You never know when it may come in handy...

[SkeletSpook]

12 minutes ago, Klear said:

 

Hold onto it! You never know when it may come in handy...

 

Maybe it already has... 

 

Spoiler

(it hasn't)

 

[Weird Sandwich]

3 hours ago, SkeletSpook said:

Signed in just to get on this hype train (altho I'm sure I still have an account somewhere from many years ago).Really liking this WAD, but I also echo some sentiments I've seen here:
 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Part of me was slightly disappointed when I realised what the mod was actually doing. I was already aware that it was a House of Leaves kind of thing but then stuff like the Backrooms and Poolrooms showing up felt a bit too familiar and I wished the WAD had done its own thing a bit more. I think "Liminal Space horror" definitely has a lot of potential as a genre without falling back on the same tropes over and over. On the other hand, the familiarity does have something nice to it and it's fun to see some of these creepypasta locations in the Doom engine and how they are transposed onto the lay-out of the House. It's almost like visiting a place from the collective unconscious.
Still, definitely not the most original thing. Even the opening section where the House keeps changing slightly reminded me a lot of the game Anatomy.

 

Incidentally I'm playing through Control at the moment and it's interesting to see both Control an myhouse.wad do similar things, they're both clearly influenced by House of Leaves as well as internet horror (in Control's case SCP foundation, I don't think Backrooms was already such a thing when it came out). But whereas Control takes the core elements of its influences to build its own thing, myhouse.wad copies and pastes its influences, only tweaking them slightly. That said, there's some stuff myhouse.wad legit does better than Control, such as creating a sense of dream logic.

 

My real joy from the WAD came mostly from just discovering how deep the rabbit hole kept going, stuff like finding out you could go to a mirrored Underhalls or a hospital after you died, literally made me laugh out loud at how crazy detailled and expansive it all is.

 

One thing I haven't seen discussed here, but I haven't gone through all 29 pages so I'm sure it was, is how the picture of Steve and Tom feels off, could it be AI generated?

 

 

 

Spoiler

It's funny, I was also thinking of the Control comparison this morning and coming to a similar conclusion. Control is very clearly heavily inspired by SCP, but creates it's own unique world using similar themes and ideas. I guess this approach is more what I was hoping for from this wad after seeing its reaction. The author is clearly talented and skilled enough to have made more unique environments, so it just comes down to an artistic choice by them that I don't think works for some people.

 

I'm glad you brought up Anatomy, too. The burning house section felt like something straight out of a Kitty Horrorshow game, in a good way. I'd recommend people who like this wad to also try out Anatomy and the Haunted Cities collections, similar sort of vibes.

 

As for your last point about the photo potentially being an AI image, it would at least offer a reason for the wad directly replicating so many popular liminal spaces  - Perhaps the wad is meant to have been created by the internet itself, through an AI known as Steve, and is piecing these bits together. This AI could then presumably take over any abandoned old Doomworld account to post the wad, such as Veddge's. However I'm not really a fan of this interpretation, as it goes against the more personal feeling parts of the wad and weakens them. Also not sure why an AI would feel compelled to make this.

 

Edited May 9, 2023 by Weird Sandwich